Hey neighbors!

I had a couple of questions regarding the 1st Gen (i.e. R50, R52 & R53) heated windshield (AKA "visibility package")... an option that was not officially available to those of us south of the border, but as I understand it, reasonably prevalent in the Great White North.

So... which of you has the option in your MINI and can answer some of my basic questions on it?

 

What do you need to know? My MINI doesn't have the heated windshield, but I am a MINI MA, so hopefully I can help.

 

Primarily, how does it get activated? Does it come on automatically when you set your heater controls to defrost the windshield (i.e. with heated air), or is there a separate switch to activate it, like there is for the rear windshield?

If there is a separate switch, where is it located and what does it look like?

The reason I ask all this... I am potentially in an extremely rare position of being able to retrofit this to my MINI... but I want to understand all of the components that go into this option. The only two I am acutely aware of now are:

1. Power connector to right (passenger) side of windshield - part of the main wiring harness
2. Special heated windshield itself

I have both of those covered, although I will have to go through alternate channels (also from Canada!) to obtain the windshield, because MINIUSA is asinine in blocking access to OEM parts for options that were not made for sale in the USA.

I just need to understand how it works better so that I can dig through the parts database and see what else I need to get it working.

 

I think it is controlled by a button on the heater controls panel. On mine (manual controls, so the buttons are located around the dials), I have the A/C on the top RH, Air Recirc on the bottom RH, and IIRC rear defrost on the bottom LH. I have a "blank" button on the top LH, which I believe is for the heated front windscreen (which I don't have).

This is the panel I'm talking about:
http://www.realoem.com/bmw/showparts...21&hg=64&fg=20

 

Awesome - that points me in the right direction, although in my case I have the automatic AC... the other page for the automatic AC also shows a specific control panel for the visibility package:

http://www.realoem.com/bmw/showparts...20&hg=64&fg=20

Thanks Ferro!

 

My apologies for not getting back to this sooner - it was a long weekend up here, and I was away. Ferroequine got it right; there is a button on the ACC for activating the heater, though I thought that the wiring for it came through the rear view mirror, though I have never looked elsewhere on the windscreen. Good luck with it.

 

No worries, Tobias... I got the info I needed, and I ordered a new A/C control unit... those things are expensive! Ouch!

I can confirm that the wiring itself for the heated windshield is independent of the rear view mirror. It's part of the body harness, actually.

 

Oh no, are the techs going to be ripping apart Mr. OEMs wiring, again.

 

Nope.